My father spent his career in the printing industry. He taught me that attention to detail without regard to time turned out a fine product — like the high quality photography "coffee table" type books that he produced, many of them taking months to print.

He taught me at a very early age that "you can't have it fast and good." Maybe that's why I drove by the "Same Day Service" dry cleaners in my town for 28 years and never went in — that is, until last month.

I had been invited to a wedding and knew exactly what I wanted to wear. Usually I'm not that anal in my wardrobe planning but the wedding was in Baja California, Mexico, and I needed to take a "packable" dress.

Of course, I took the perfect packable dress out of my closet the day before departure and it was not in perfect packable shape. It had a spot of something (probably from the last wedding!) front and center. It had to be cleaned and fast! That's how I came to be acquainted with the speedy dry cleaners in my town, who, by the way, did a marvelous job on the dress, thereby clearly invalidating one of my father's favorite axioms. "Hmmm," I thought, "could Dad have been wrong on this?"

Can Hiring (like dry cleaning) Be Fast and Good?

Yes! When you make a concerted effort to hire in a shortened amount of time, in most cases it can be done. Here's how to make it work:

• Have a clear idea of what you're looking for
• Have a fixed schedule in front of you to dedicate to interviews
• Have a solid offer and a start date in mind
• Have a "Bias for Action" (thank you for putting that in our lexicon, Tom Peters)
• Have a deadline date for making an offer

Make Hiring the Priority — Not "The Process"

Here's what the dry cleaners did. They put my dress to the front of the line. That's right. The same-day premium service comes with a premium price, but I didn't care. I needed it done and done fast. (And, I suspect it didn't knock their schedule out of whack too much.) Do the same thing. Put your hiring to the front of the line.

But What About "The Hiring Process"?

During the time that my father was in the printing business, a long process guaranteed a good result. Every detail was painstakingly reviewed by the naked eye and changes were hard to make. This pushed out publication dates.

Today, my dad would be amazed to see full-color brochures printed with one touch of a button, and he would marvel at the digital speed and quality that would impact his industry so much. Technology transformed the printing business.

The same is true for hiring. With a plethora of ways to find and qualify candidates, email resumes, do phone interviews, web-based presentations, etc., you would think the hiring process would be shortened. But, sadly, many hiring managers think if they "short circuit" the process (i.e., it's not a long one), they won't have a good result. Some hiring managers are more tied into the process than they are the result of getting their position filled with a qualified candidate in a reasonable amount of time.

So get onboard with this concept because you just may be losing a good candidate to the "fast and good" hiring manager if you don't tighten up your process.

Can You Do This? I Think So…

Here's how it worked with one of our clients. In a conversation with the hiring manager early on Monday morning, we got his commitment to make this hire his priority for the week. We all agreed that our goal was to have an offer accepted by Friday at 5 p.m. It was an aggressive goal. (By the way, this spot had been open for two months.)

We immediately identified two candidates for his marketing communications position that day. By Monday at 6 p.m. interviews were set up for Tuesday and Wednesday. Both candidates went in both days for first and second interviews. Second interviews were with his whole team. Writing samples were submitted by Wednesday night. The hiring manager made his decision late on Wednesday night and a verbal offer was made on Thursday morning. References were checked on Thursday and the offer letter was mailed by 5 p.m. The offer was accepted on Friday morning — a full seven hours before deadline!

And, here's the best part — it was FUN for everyone involved! We all felt challenged to get it done. There was no long, drawn-out process. We set a goal and we met it. It was exhilarating! And, by the way, our marketing communications manager has made a substantial contribution to their organization and loves her job.

So, if you need that spot filled as much as I needed that dress cleaned, you CAN get it done in a relatively short amount of time. Why, I bet if my dad were alive today he'd be having so much fun with his Adobe PhotoShop, my mother would be complaining about the competition!